Months after an originally announced spring move, officials say the city’s takeover of the art gallery building, as well as the relocation there of the library’s central branch, are both still on track.

“We’re hoping to have this done and in front of city council very, very soon,” said Art Gallery of Windsor board president Sean White.

Mayor Eddie Francis said negotiations are being finalized and that a report should be going before council for its approval in September.

Council agreed in principle last November to a deal that would see ownership of the iconic building transferred to the city and the art gallery share its home with the Windsor Public Library, which would give up its current operations at 850 Ouellette Ave. Together with the aquatic centre under construction, as well as consideration of locating a new community museum in that neighbourhood, city officials touted the creation of a “cultural hub” west of the downtown.

Last fall, the mayor described the library move as urgent because the 100,000-square-foot central branch — considered too large for the library’s needs — was needed to help a large employer maintain its local operations and preserve hundreds of jobs. Without naming the company in question — widely believed to be Sutherland Global — Francis said the urgency has since receded but that there are still two potential private sector investors keen on acquiring the library-owned building at 850 Ouellette.

Meanwhile, space once occupied by the art gallery’s gift shop and restaurant has sat empty for close to a year.

“That had nothing to do with us,” said Francis.

White agrees, saying the decision on those closures was made independently as part of ongoing efforts to save money, which is the reason the AGW agreed to the city takeover deal in the first place.

“Absolutely — the status quo was unsustainable,” said White.

Under the agreement still being finalized for council’s approval, the city takes ownership of the AGW’s home valued at $22 million and assumes the outstanding mortgage of about $2.5 million. The city also assumes maintenance and upkeep costs currently estimated at $600,000 a year, while the AGW, which stays on as a rent-free tenant of the upper two floors, loses its current annual city operating grant of $450,000 a year.

The library gives up its building at 850 Ouellette, which currently receives 800,000 visits a year, and gets the ground floor. The reason for last year’s announcement ahead of any deal being reached, it was explained at the time, was in order to notify contractors vying to build the aquatic centre that they no longer had to incorporate a library into their designs.

Francis said the money-losing AGW building is “too big for them to manage and afford.”

White concurs. “With two floors … we will be able to provide world-class programming for the community, without question,” he said.

White said the negotiations with the city have been “continuing in good faith” but that they involve “a lot of moving parts.”

One of the challenges has been the library, in an upheaval since the Maghnieh Affair spending scandal surfaced in April, which triggered an almost complete turnover of the library’s board and the lengthy sick leave and subsequent departure of its CEO.

“Nothing has changed on this matter as far as I know,” recently appointed library board chairman Peter Frise said in an email Thursday. “As I understand it, this matter was an agreement between the city and the previous board of the day,” he added.

Francis said he also expects city council to be dealing in September with the final consultant’s report proposing the most suitable site for a new community museum. An early draft of the report recommends an expansion of the AGW building.

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